Shadow Of The Mountain (33 page)

Tenlon realized he was on his feet and facing them now, squared off paces away from the cutthroat. He looked to Desik, but the Amorian had already returned to lean against the bar, his back to the tavern area.

Maybe he really was drunk, Tenlon thought.

Gil absently released Gemma, who leapt from his clutches and fell beside her mother.

“Gather your boyfriend…” Desik prompted Tenlon with a whisper.

“What?”

“Say it!”

His mouth suddenly felt too dry to speak but he was in the middle of it now. No way out but forward. He cleared his throat.

“Gather your boyfriend,” Tenlon heard himself say, each word hollow as a pebble bouncing down a long well.

“What?” the pirate asked venomously, rising up and sliding his wooden chair back. He pointed down at his still friend. “Did you just do that? You didn’t really do that, did you? I swear I’ll open you up from apple to anus if you threw that mug.”

“Louder,” Desik hissed.

“Gather your boyfriend!” Tenlon’s voice rose up. “And piss off!”

The man watched Tenlon for a moment, struggling to wrap his mind around what was occurring. He was about to say something when his gaze fell to the Amorian warrior.

Desik angled himself to cast an eye on the bearded man, still leaning against the bar with one boot on the lowest rung of a stool. Ever so slowly a tattooed hand slid his long jacket back, exposing the sword at his hip before finally resting a hand on pommel.

“Oh,” Gil said with renewed understanding. “Are you sure this is the direction you want to take?” The pirate’s fingers curled around the black hilt of his own sword and he began to draw. “I don’t think you’ve thought this--”

His words ended as Desik spun, flinging yet another mug through the air. This one still had some ale that spilled out as it soared across the bar, crashing into Gil’s face in another spectacular hit. The mug burst apart, snapping his head back as he stumbled a few steps, landing on his side.

Even before the pieces hit to the floor, Desik was off like an arrow.

The tail of his jacket stretched out as he hurdled the first table between them and flipped the second table up and to the side with one hand, sending candles and wine crashing to the floor. He heel-kicked Gil in the teeth before pinning him down with a heavy boot to the throat.

The man howled something frantic through his crushed airway, spitting up blood. His fingers clawed at the boot, trying to wrestle free. Desik took one of the hands in his grip and pulled it upwards, twisting it around sharply until Gil cried out.

Tenlon saw the flash of steel in Desik’s hand; a small knife he’d brought out of nowhere.

“What do you think?” he asked over his shoulder, holding the knife to the wheezing man’s hand, calm as a still pond. He tapped the flat of the blade against the pirate’s knuckles. “Should we take a finger? A thumb?”

Tenlon felt numb all over. “No, just…” He couldn’t even think of what to say. “Just let them go.”

Desik appeared surprised. “Let them go?” He stared down at the man subdued beneath his hands and boot as if he were asking the question to him. “Let them go…”

Turning around, he looked to Gemma and Gerta. The pair were huddled together, Gemma’s face red with tears and Gerta sporting a cut on her forehead that was bleeding down to her eyebrow. Lanard was still unconscious on the floor like a tipped-over purple statue.

It was then Tenlon was sure the warrior would murder the pirate right there on the floor. He could see it on his face, his posture, on the blade in his hand.

But the moment passed.

“You can keep your bits and pieces for today,” Desik’s voiced sneered down from above. “But the boy told you to piss off, and you should’ve listened to him.”

He clenched the knife in his teeth and adjusted his grip on Gil’s arm, then jerked it violently to the side until it snapped and the man’s screams filled the tavern.

***

Brock was just beginning to calm down, finishing yet another tall cup of wine behind the bar. Upon returning to find his wife bleeding and daughter in tears, he’d walked right past the wooden club and tore down his great sword, eyes blazing like an overweight demon. Gil and the blond one managed to shamble out of the Lonely Fox before Brock could cut them into slabs and toss them over the cliffs, and had they been a few moments slower Tenlon really thought that’s how they would have met their end. Brock was big, he was overcome with fury, and he carried a sword that could probably split a man in half.

“Look at me,” Brock held his hands out to Desik. “I’m shaking I’m so angry.”

After the incident with the pirates, he’d closed the tavern for the night, locking up all the doors. Tenlon didn’t think he’d have many other patrons anyway. The Volrathi would be here any day now.

“You know that’s normal,” Desik offered from the other side of the bar.

The long jacket was off again and Gerta was busy on his bicep with needle and thread. His action against the pirates had opened the wounds entirely and the bartender’s wife had set to mending him up.

“Those were Okin Burback’s men. Did you know that?” Brock asked. “I appreciate what you did, but you’ll be a marked man now. No one treats Okin’s men like that.”

“Who is he?” Desik asked.

“He’s a pirate, but even more than that, he runs things around here. He’s got a fleet of ships, including the
Rapture
. That one’s attacked more merchant vessels in these parts than any others combined. You’d best be making your way out of the city first chance you get.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

Lanard was lying on a table with a cold washcloth over his face. Upon rising earlier he’d instantly sought to lie back down and hadn’t budged since.

“Brock, I do believe I vomited on your floor,” he announced without moving. “You may take the damages out of this evening’s jar.”

Brock smiled for the first time since returning. “You ain’t got no coins in there, you nut.”

“Then the jar is yours!” the musician professed with a wave of his hand. “Fill it with all the things I never could in this life: riches, family, true love.”

“A career,” Gemma chimed in, lifting the cloth from his face to cringe at his swollen nose.

Tenlon laughed to himself, picking up the overturned chairs with Hagart and returning them to tables. He was so close to Gemma now that his legs were shaking. They still hadn’t spoken yet. Perhaps he had missed his chance.

“Leave him be, child,” Gerta told at her daughter. “You know he’s part of this family just as much as you.”

“I’ve been tossing an idea around,” Hagart moved toward Desik at the bar. “Are you still looking to book passage on a ship?”

Tenlon’s ears perked up, but he kept helping with the scattered table and chairs.

“Our situation hasn’t changed in the last hour,” Desik said smoothly.

Brock laughed heartily at this as he returned his sword to its proper place.

“Well, it seems ours has,” the old sailor said. “Brock is like a brother, and I didn’t know the strangers asking for help at the bar would be so quick to answer his family’s call for it. I do think he’s in a bit of a debt to you and your friend here. I may be able to help.”

“I have been running up quite the bar tab,” Desik spread his hands. “I wouldn’t object to that being paid.”Hagart laughed. “How’s passage on a ship sound?”

“Even better. When is it leaving?”

“Noon tomorrow,” Hagart replied.

“Where’s it going?”

The sailor seemed uncertain. “We’ll be bouncing around from port to port, gathering some news, then find a safe spot of land for you and your friend here to make your way.”

Tenlon glanced at Desik, waiting for what he’d say. “Noon, yeah? Think it could be pushed back an hour or two? We’ve some business to attend to before departing. I can pay.”

Hagart didn’t seem to like this, but agreed. “I can wait a bit, but not long mind you. Volrathi are closing in on us as we speak.”

“And are you the man who can make such a call?”

“Of course,” Hagart said. “It’s my ship.”

Desik’s eyebrows lifted. “Perfect,” he said, shaking hands with the man. “Two hours more, maybe three.”

Tenlon wondered when Desik would bring up Lesandra and Darien coming along, though said nothing of it. They had the money to pay for their passage, but perhaps now wasn’t the time to ask for extra favors.

“There’s one other thing you should know,” Brock interjected, finishing his wine. “Gemma will be going with you.”

Tenlon’s stomach dropped. He turned to Gemma and was shocked to see her staring at him from the other side of the table. She tilted her head to one side and gave him a soft smile.

It hit him like a sledgehammer to the heart.

Only after his world stopped quaking beneath his feet and returned to normal could he gather the courage to speak.
Now
! His mind screamed.

“Hello,” he said to her.

“Hi,” she said back.

Chapter 18

Natalia wiped Argos’s forehead with a damp cloth, exchanging a worried glance with her handmaiden. The warrior’s fever had dropped during the night, due in part to the tea she had given him made from dry Axian leaves, but he was still in great danger from the poisoned wound to his side. The tea fought the fever, but the toxins were still spreading.

Argos was dying, and it would take someone making more than just tea to save him. They would need to find help soon, true help.

The spacious manor they’d spent the last few nights in after his collapse in the Bronze Square was thoroughly ransacked. Overturned furniture, destroyed artwork, and shattered pottery littered the two-story structure. Pantry cabinets were open and empty, mirrors and windows broken, and anything of value had been removed by the looters. She and Karin had barricaded the main entrance as best they could, but it was nothing that would stop a few angry men who wanted inside. Silence would be their greatest form of concealment.

Under the smoke-hazed night, it had taken the both of them to half-carry Argos the few blocks to the northern city wall. He had slipped in and out consciousness the entire time, blood running freely from his wound and skin hot to the touch.

The house of marble and graystone they’d found was nestled right up against the defensive wall. The doorframe to the manor and heavy oak entrance were splintered apart, but the high end of the door still clung tightly to the brass hinges and they had been able to slip through. Once Argos had been settled inside, Karin took a half-empty jug of wine she’d found and poured it over any trail of bloodspots they may have left behind. She’d rested the empty jug on the side of the street.

Upon her return they had left the door slightly ajar, leaning several pieces of furniture against it from within. A passerby outside would see the entrance still open and hopefully assume little of value would be left in such a place, while the shifting furniture would make enough noise to alert them of anyone trying to gain entrance. Natalia knew it wasn’t much and hoped to be gone from the place as soon as Argos could move. The further they were from the city, the better. That had been three nights ago.

The back of the home’s second floor boasted an open balcony that stretched out over the wall itself, offering splendid views of the northern forest and surrounding mountain ranges. The treeline to the woods was just a stone’s throw away from the wall, the forest beyond dark and threatening even in the new morning light.

Argos was propped up on a low-backed chair of leather with his axe leaning against his leg, resting in shadow away from the warm rays of sun that beamed in through the open balcony doors. He’d adamantly refused to lie down in any bed and was found crawling out of the one they’d first laid him in.

Stupid boys
, Natalia had thought as she helped him to his feet. Even if it killed him getting there, he wanted to be in a position to fight. A chair was the compromise.

Karin gently lifted Argos’s blood-stained tunic to look at his side.

The sections of white bed sheets they had bound his torso in had a small dot of blood showing through the fabric. Natalia had had only water with which to clean the wound before stitching and though she’d stopped the bleeding, the poison was still killing him. Had she not found the Axian leaves in the corner of a kitchen cupboard for the tea and poultice, he likely would have died that first night. The days were long and quiet and she’d allowed herself little sleep, fretting over Argos every few minutes until his fever lessened.

Those had been frightening hours, but he still clung to life. Now it was time to figure a way out of here for all of them. The tea was running low and the poison spreading through his body would win out eventually, unless more skilled help was found.

“He looks better,” Karin said, sliding a piece of damp hair off his forehead.

“He looks like shit,” Argos wheezed under his breath. His eyes were rimmed and face ghostly pale.

“Still the charmer though, isn’t he?” Karin remarked.

They both heard a horse outside then, hooves drumming the thin grass between wall and forest at a steady trot. It sounded like a calm gait, yet it filled Natalia with anxiety.

Silently she gathered her bow and a single arrow before tiptoeing out onto the balcony in her bare feet for a look. The air was brisk, the stone beneath her cold and still a little slippery with morning dew. Crouching low, she moved with more care as she approached the edge of the balcony.

Remaining hidden behind a partially broken statue until the sound of hoofbeats pulled away from her, she leaned out just enough to see the rider disappear around the bend of the wall. Atop a dapple-gray mare, he was a heavyset man with long, dirt-blond hair tied back by a leather band. His sloping shoulders sat hunched over the reins in his hands, and a large sword and scabbard rested across his back.

“Ugly,” Talia whispered to herself. She swiftly returned inside.